Times are tough all over the country, but a new report shows that Pennsylvanians are losing their employer-provided health insurance faster than people who live in many other states. The report comes from the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center (PBPC), and says close to 700,000 Pennsylvanians who had such coverage at the start of this decade had lost it by 2007-2008.

PBPC executive director Sharon Ward says the findings point to a foundational crack in the current health care system.

"Health care is something that we can no longer take for granted, and both adults and children need to have an affordable alternative if health care insurance through employers is no longer available."

As for what happens to those whose work-based health insurance goes away, Ward says there are varying consequences.

"Some of them are uninsured, some of them may be getting health care or health insurance through an individual policy, but more of them are ending up on public programs."

Ward says that when you talk about potential solutions through health care reform, both employer and employee have to be taken into consideration.

"It's important that health care is affordable to employers, but also again that there's an affordable option for folks if they lose a job or if their employer no longer provides health insurance."

Pennsylvania does rank tenth in the nation in the number of employers offering coverage, so Ward says the state has more to lose than most, because more people were covered to begin with.

The rate of employer coverage here dropped from just under 76 percent in 2000-2001 to less than 70 percent in the 2007 and 2008 period.

The full report can be found at www.pennbpc.org 

Tom Joseph, Public News Service - PA